News

2012-04-03 10:35:12.08

Chicago Woman Wins $250,000 In Missouri

Myrtle Hollingsworth of Bellwood, Ill., was traveling through Missouri with her husband and ended up with a $250,000 winning Mega Millions® ticket. Because of the high jackpot, the 60-year-old retiree said she was buying tickets everywhere they stopped on a return trip from Louisiana. She bought a $5 Quick Pick at Reeves Boomland, 100 Beasley Park Road in Charleston, that matched all five white-ball numbers in the March 27 drawing.

“We always stop at Boomland,” she explained. “When we were coming through this time, we just got gas, ate something, bought a few things, pecans, and I bought my five Lottery tickets.”

Hollingsworth realized she held the winning ticket while watching the drawing after returning home.

“I always watch the drawings,” she said, adding that she checked her numbers right after.

“I went crazy. I scared everybody in the house.”

Asked to describe her “happy dance,” Hollingsworth elaborated.

“It was not a dance. It was just jumping up and down like a jack-in-the-box,” she laughed.

Overwhelmed, Hollingsworth hid the ticket between two boxes, not even telling her husband, Winston, where she put it.

“I said, ‘If I drop dead right now, nobody is ever going to be able to find the ticket,” she told him. “He said, ‘Oh, I’ll find it.’”

Hollingsworth said the win set her “on easy street.” She plans to pad her retirement, take more vacations and help family.

“We have a big family,” she explained. “So it’s dwindled a little. But still, I could never be in this position without that win.”

She will continue to play the Lottery, “hopefully not more,” but, “like I was playing.”

“I never thought I could win this,” Hollingsworth said. “Now, I have confidence that I can. You have to be in it to win it. And that’s it. Don’t go overboard.”

Mega Millions is a multi-Lottery Draw Game with jackpots that start at $12 million. Drawings are held at 10 p.m. on Tuesday and Friday. For an extra $1 at the time of purchase, players can add Megaplier® to win larger non-jackpot prizes.

The winning numbers for the March 27 drawing were: 9, 19, 34, 44 and 51.